Sudhir Dhawale – free them all

APCR condemns detention of protesters over posters of political prisoners / Mumbai Event Highlighting Constitutional Values

24/07/2026 Asha

APCR condemns detention of Goa NEET protesters over posters of political prisoners, alleges criminalisation of dissent

30/07/2026

Maktoobmedia / by Maktoob

According to APCR, the controversy began when activist Danish displayed a placard at a peaceful gathering following the Education Minister’s resignation over paper leaks, calling for the release of undertrial prisoners, including Sharjeel Imam, Umar Khalid and the Bhima Koregaon accused.
The Association for Protection of Civil Rights (APCR) on Thursday condemned the detention and criminal proceedings against activist Sudeep Dalvi, Danish and other NEET protesters in Goa, alleging that the state was using criminal law to suppress peaceful dissent and violate constitutional freedoms.
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The Jantar Mantar Student Protest: Anger, Accountability, and Democratic Rights

29/07/2026

Countercurrents.org / by Dinkar Kapoor

… It must also be noted that the anger brewing against the Modi government stems partly from the systematic erosion of democratic and constitutional rights. The government has suppressed every voice of dissent through repression. Some of the nation’s finest minds—such as Anand Teltumbde, Gautam Navlakha, Umar Khalid, Prabir Purkayastha, Sudha Bharadwaj, and Satyam Verma—have been imprisoned. Organizing sit-ins, protests, fasts, movements, or marches has become not merely difficult but virtually impossible in the country. Individuals committed to social causes—who strengthen democracy—were branded as “Andolanjeevi” (professional protesters), “anti-nationals,” and even “cockroaches.” Institutions that bolster the democratic system and channel public outrage toward democratic resolutions have been dismantled.
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‘Free Umar Khalid’ placard draws police action at Goa protest

26/07/2026

The Indian Express / by Pavneet Singh Chadha

Goa police detain man for carrying a placard that said ‘Free Umar Khalid, Sharjeel Imam, Bhima Koregaon 16’. Came after BJP Yuva Morcha workers staged a protest demanding his arrest
Goa Police Saturday evening detained a man for allegedly carrying a “Free Umar Khalid” placard at a gathering organised to express solidarity with the protests at Jantar Mantar in Delhi and to mark the resignation of former Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan.
According to the police, the incident took place around 7 pm, when people gathered at the Azad Maidan in Panaji were raising slogans. Police said one of the protesters was carrying a placard that read, “Free Umar Khalid, Sharjeel Imam, Bhima Koregaon 16”.
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‘Refuse to Lift Your Lathis’: 1800 Citizens Write Open Letter to Security Forces At Jantar Mantar

25/07/2026

The Wire / by The Wire Staff

“Next time an order like this comes to you to savagely attack innocent peaceful protesters you must stop and think, and you must refuse to lift your lathi,” the letter read.
A group of concerned citizens, with over 1800 signatories, have written an open letter to the police and security forces deployed at Jantar Mantar, Delhi, following visuals of a violent crackdown on student protesters on July 20, 2026. Appealing directly to the personnel’s conscience, the letter asks them to resist orders to attack peaceful demonstrators. The letter has been circulated in 15 Indian languages, apart from English: Bengali, Garhwali, Hindi, Kannada, Kashmiri, Khasi, Maithili, Malayalam, Marathi, Nepali, Punjabi, Rajasthani, Tamizh, Telugu and Urdu.
Read the full letter

“Hum Bharat Ke Log”: Tushar Gandhi Leads Mumbai Event Highlighting Constitutional Values & Democratic Rights

24/07/2026

Free Press Journal / by Poonam Apraj

Around 200 activists, students, writers and citizens gathered in Mumbai for ‘Hum Bharat Ke Log – Voice of Resistance’, a cultural programme highlighting constitutional values. Presided over by Tushar Gandhi, the event saw the launch of the ‘Lawyers of Students’ app for legal aid to protesting students. Speakers discussed democracy, justice, equality and peaceful civic participation.
… Those present included Dhananjay Shinde, Aamir Kazi, Guddi Tiwari, Sudhir Dhawale, Suvarna Salve, Subodh More, Tejas, Huma Namal, actor Sushant Singh, Akshay from Raigad and Advocate Todkar.
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CJP protest row: Mumbai Police book Shivaji Park organisers for unlawful assembly

20/07/2026

The Indian Express / by Express News Service

The organisers of the Shivaji Park protest are facing an FIR for ‘unlawful assembly’ as the Mumbai Police said, no permission was granted to carry out the demonstration.
… Earlier, the Mumbai Police had registered two FIRs in connection with the protests that were carried out in south Mumbai on Saturday in support of Sonam Wangchuk.The first FIR was registered at the Marine Drive police station against the NCP (Sharad Pawar) faction party workers for protesting near Mantralaya, and the second against left party organisations for protesting near the Press Club. The seven people booked include Sudhir Dhawale, an accused in the Elgar Parishad case who received bail last year.
Read more

Also read:
▪ The exam crisis that became a battle for accountability (SabrangIndia / Jul 2026)
▪ CJP protest: From Shillong to Mumbai, solidarity demonstrations held across India (Scroll.in / Jul 2026)
▪ How Maharashtra’s folk traditions fuel Sudhir Dhawale’s tireless cultural resistance against caste (Scroll.in / Apr 2026)
▪ As Maharashtra Govt Brings Bill Against ‘Urban Naxalism’, Activists Fear Criminalisation of Dissent (The Wire / Jul 2025)
▪ How Kabir Kala Manch, the anti-caste cultural troupe, challenges the hierarchical social order (Scroll.in / Jul 2024)
▪ Kabir Kala Manch: A History of Revolutionary Singing and State Repression (ritimo / April 2022)
▪ Singing on the beats of resistance: Relaa collective and the cultural activists of Maharashtra (ritimo.org / Apr 2022)
▪ Maharashtra: Activists, Lawyers Added to ‘Union War Book’, Listed as ‘Enemies of the State’ (The Wire / Jul 2021)

In Defence of the Profanity of Protesters / Exam anger becomes a political reckoning

19/07/2026 Asha

Mumbai. Pic credits: Sayyed Sameer Abedi / Mid-Day

In Defence of the Profanity of Protesters

30/07/2026

The Wire / by Anand Teltumbde

The state had a script for slogans, petitions, op-eds – the standard grammar of Indian dissent, which it had learned to out-shout, outspend or simply wait out over ten years in power. It had no script at all for being laughed at.

When the great lord passes the wise peasant bows deeply and silently farts.
–Ethiopian proverb

On July 24, Dharmendra Pradhan resigned as Union education minister – the first such casualty a citizens’ movement has extracted from Narendra Modi’s government in more than a decade in power. It is worth asking why this movement, of all the movements this government has faced down and outlasted, actually worked. Part of the answer lies in something India’s commentariat has been strangely reluctant to say out loud: the “Cockroaches” won partly because they were rude.
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CJP protests | Exam anger becomes a political reckoning

24/07/2026

Deccan Herald / by Bharat Bhushan

Pan-India protests against the events of July 20 have marked a significant shift in Indian politics, moribund for 12 years under Prime Minister Narendra Modi. What began as a narrow protest about examination leaks has become a generational statement about the lack of institutional accountability.
… A movement of such diversity resists easy categorisation. This is making it harder for the government to neutralise it by its usual strategy of labelling its critics as anti-national. Whereas it attempted to brand earlier protest movements as political extremists such as Punjab farmers as ‘Khalistani’; anti-CAA protestors as representing sectarian ‘Muslim unrest’; linking civil rights’ activists in the Bhima-Koregaon case to ‘Naxalite extremists’, and the infamous attempt to label JNU students as being sympathetic to Kashmiri militants.
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Why Should Protesters Seek Police Permission?

22/07/2026

The Wire / by Anand Teltumbde

The police response to the students’ march in Delhi raises a disturbing question. Had the police begun to resemble street goons, or had street goons been absorbed into the policing of democratic dissent?
On July 20, the long-running protest at Delhi’s Jantar Mantar took a dramatic turn. For nearly three weeks, an uneasy calm had prevailed around the indefinite fast of Sonam Wangchuk and three students demanding accountability for repeated examination leaks and the resignation of Union education minister Dharmendra Pradhan. The original permission to assemble had long since expired, yet, curiously, the police allowed the protest to continue, perhaps calculating that it would eventually lose momentum.
Instead, the opposite happened.
Read more

The exam crisis that became a battle for accountability

21/07/2026

Sabrang India / by Sabrang India

From student grievances to Sonam Wangchuk’s hunger strike, the movement questioned accountability, democracy and the limits of State intervention
On July 20, 2026, the streets around Delhi’s Jantar Mantar became the centre of a rapidly escalating confrontation between a student-led movement demanding accountability over alleged failures in the education system and a State determined to prevent the protest from moving towards Parliament.
… In Mumbai, the state’s restrictive approach to public assembly has turned the city into a theater of confrontation.
Read more

CJP protest row: Mumbai Police book Shivaji Park organisers for unlawful assembly

20/07/2026

The Indian Express / by Express News Service

Mumbai Police Register Three FIRs Over Uddhav Thackeray-Led Protest Backing Sonam Wangchuk

20/07/2026

Lokmat Times / by Lokmat Times Desk

Mumbai Police have registered three FIRs in connection with the protest led by Shiv Sena (UBT) chief Uddhav Thackeray on Sunday in support of activist Sonam Wangchuk. According to the police, the first FIR concerns the alleged organisation of the protest without prior permission. The second relates to appeals made to the public to gather at the venue despite the lack of official approval. The third FIR was filed after students reportedly continued demonstrations at various locations in Dadar even after the main protest ended, causing major traffic congestion. Police said no arrests have been made in any of the three cases so far.
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Elgar Parishad accused booked for protesting in support of Sonam Wangchuk

19/07/2026

Hindustan Times / by HT Correspondent

Azad Maidan police said the protestors were booked for unlawful assembly and allowed to leave after being served notices to present themselves if required
MUMBAI: Activist and writer Sudhir Dhawale and a few others were booked by the police for protesting outside Azad Maidan on Saturday, in connection with the alleged forcible removal of activist Sonam Wangchuk from Jantar Mantar in Delhi. Dhawale is one of the accused in the Elgar Parishad case and was released on bail from the Taloja Central Jail in January 2025.
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CJP protest in Mumbai: How Azad Maidan became the city’s site of agitations, with restrictions

19/07/2026

The Indian Express / by Sadaf Modak

Azad Maidan as a site of protest can be traced back to a 1997 court case. Since then, several rules have been laid down on the manner of protests allowed, including weekend restrictions, a ban on hunger strikes, and the slogans that can be raised.
Mumbai-based activists and citizens have been gathering at the Azad Maidan since last week in solidarity with the Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) protest being held at Jantar Mantar, New Delhi, over the NEET-UG 2026 entrance examination paper leak.
On Saturday (July 18), the Mumbai Police filed two FIRs against some of the protestors, citing the Public Meetings, Agitations and Processions Rules, 2025, which prohibit protests at the maidan on weekends.
Read more

Also read:
▪ Who Answers to Us?: The Jantar Mantar Protests and India’s Missing Idea of Accountability (The Wire | by Anand Teltumbde | Jul 2026)
▪ The exam crisis that became a battle for accountability (SabrangIndia / Jul 2026)
▪ CJP protest: From Shillong to Mumbai, solidarity demonstrations held across India (Scroll.in / Jul 2026)
▪ How Maharashtra’s folk traditions fuel Sudhir Dhawale’s tireless cultural resistance against caste (Scroll.in / Apr 2026)
▪ Elgar Parishad case accused at event that attacked Maharashtra Public Security Bill, cops to seek bail review (TOI / May 2026)
▪ Sudhir Dhawale: “This is a bigger prison” (The Caravan | by Sudhir Dhawale | Apr 2025)
▪ Interview | Sudhir Dhawale’s Work Will Go on (The Wire / Feb 2025)
▪ Sudhir Dhawale interview: ‘The law remains blind to injustice even with the blindfold gone’ (Scroll.in / Feb 2025)

Mumbai Press Club Suspensions Over Elgar Parishad Accused Visit Spark Row; NIA Inquiry Raises Stakes

02/05/2026 Asha

Anand Patwardhan: The taming of the Mumbai Press Club

07/05/2026

Scroll.in / by Anand Patwardhan

The expulsion of the institution’s former president and two other veteran journalists is a sign of how spaces for democratic discussion are shrinking in India.
… The reasons advanced for Singh’s expulsion are instructive. Apparently, he was present at a discussion on prison conditions held on the terrace of the Press Club where several persons who are out on bail in the Bhima Koregaon case also attended.
Read more

Mumbai Press Club Suspensions Over Elgar Parishad Accused Visit Spark Row; NIA Inquiry Raises Stakes

03/05/2026

The Wire / by Sukanya Shantha

Involvement in a legal case has never been a criterion for denying access to the club premises before. Guests, including political leaders with pending criminal cases, regularly visit the premises.
Days after the Mumbai Press Club suspended three senior members for six years for inviting human rights defenders and academics linked to the Elgar Parishad case to the club, the National Investigating Agency (NIA) has entered the controversy. In an email sent out to the members of the club, it was stated that the central agency visited the premises on Wednesday (April 29) and conducted an “inquiry”.
Read more

NIA seeks documents from Mumbai Press Club after gathering attended by Bhima Koregaon accused

02/05/2026

Scroll.in / by Scroll Staff

The club claimed that the social gathering raised questions about a possible violation of the bail conditions of the persons accused in the case.
The National Investigation Agency on Friday sought documents from the Mumbai Press Club related to a social gathering that was attended by some of the persons accused in the 2018 Bhima Koregaon case who are out on bail, the Mumbai Press Club said in a statement emailed to members.
Read more

NIA visits Mumbai Press Club after it suspends three members over Bhima Koregaon accused gathering

02/05/2026

The Indian Express / by Vallabh Ozarkar

The agency sought documents related to a January event attended by Bhima Koregaon accused out on bail, after the club suspended three members for allegedly facilitating it, a charge they deny, with former president Gurbir Singh calling it politically motivated ahead of club elections.
Two days after the Mumbai Press Club suspended three members over an event attended by accused persons out on bail in the Bhima Koregaon case, officials of the National Investigation Agency (NIA) visited the club seeking documents related to the gathering, according to a statement issued by the club Friday.
Read more

Also read:
▪ Artists, Educators, Publishers Speak Out Against ‘Rising Attempts’ to Stifle Their Voices (The Wire / Mar 2026)
▪ Mumbai Press Club Bars Elgar Parishad Defendants’ Entry, Issues Show-Cause Notice to Member (The Wire / Mar 2026)
▪ SNDT University cancels lecture by feminist historian Uma Chakravarti (Scroll.in / März 2026)
▪ ‘Controversy best avoided’: Kala Ghoda festival director after Anand Teltumbde book event cancelled (Scroll.in / Feb 2026)
▪ Stan Swamy Lecture Cancelled – A Case Study in India’s Shrinking Space for Dissent (The Print / Aug 2025)

How Maharashtra’s folk traditions fuel Sudhir Dhawale’s tireless cultural resistance against caste

14/04/2026 Asha

Pic credits: Tabassum Barnagarwala/Scroll

Scroll.in / by Freny Manecksha

For the Marathi poet-activist, song and verse are tools of social change, like they have been for Phule’s Satyashodhak Samaj and the Ambedkarite movement.
When Sudhir Dhawale was growing up in Nagpur’s Dalit-dominated Indora area in the 1970s, a calendar depicting a child with a pistol hung on the wall of his family’s rented home. It bore a slogan declaring that rights are not handed out – one has to fight to seize them.
“It was just a poster but it brought the understanding through cultural means that we needed to agitate,” said the 57-year-old Marathi poet, activist and co-founder of the Republican Panthers Caste Annihilation Movement. “We could not hope our rights would automatically flow.”
Read more

Also read:
▪ Taloja Jail: Lives Fading in Silence Behind Iron Walls (Outlook | Sudhir Dhawale | Sep 2025)
▪ Sudhir Dhawale: “This is a bigger prison” (The Caravan | by Sudhir Dhawale | Apr 2025)
▪ BK-16 Prison Diaries: Sudhir Dhawale’s poem, “Prisoners of Consciousness” (The Polis Project / March 2025)
▪ Interview | Sudhir Dhawale’s Work Will Go on (The Wire / Feb 2025)
▪ Sudhir Dhawale interview: ‘The law remains blind to injustice even with the blindfold gone’ (Scroll.in / Feb 2025)
▪ Rona Wilson and Sudhir Dhawale released: Seven years of injustice by a state that punishes dissent [read order] (Sabrangindia / Jan 2025)
▪ Singing on the beats of resistance: Relaa collective and the cultural activists of Maharashtra (ritimo.org / Apr 2022)

Video: Sudhir Dhawale on Mental Health Crisis in Indian Prisons / Lives Fading in Silence

01/10/2025 Asha

Video | Sudhir Dhawale Spoke With Outlook About Mental Health Crisis in Indian Prisons

01/10/2025

Outlook / by Priyanka Tupe

hindi /en | 46:58 | 2025
Indian Human Rights activist Sudhir Dhawale, imprisoned under UAPA in Bhima Koregaon case, exposes India’s prison mental health crisis: overcrowding, absent psychiatric care, caste-based labor, and systematic erosion of dignity.
Watch video

Taloja Jail: Lives Fading in Silence Behind Iron Walls

28/09/2025

Outlook / by Sudhir Dhawale

The author, who spent 10 years in jail, details the painful experiences of the inmates and the cold attitude of the authorities
Narya was a prisoner in Taloja Central Jail, Navi Mumbai. He was young and had already spent a few years in jail. With overgrown hair, a thick moustache and a full-grown beard, he was an eccentric who would roam the prison yard with complete disregard. Since he routinely got into quarrels with the jailer and physical fights with other inmates, people were wary of him.
Read more

An Imprisoned Mind | Mental Health Challenges Among India’s Political Prisoners

28/09/2025

Outlook / by Apeksha Priyadarshini

In Indian prisons, where the incarcerated are robbed of basic human dignity, conversations about mental health are a formidable challenge.
…
The impact of the prison architecture on the mental health of prisoners is also brought up by Gautam Navlakha, a septuagenarian human rights defender and journalist, who was arrested in the now infamous ‘Bhima Koregaon’ (BK 16) case—where 16 activists, lawyers and teachers were charged with incitement to riots at Koregaon Bhima in January 2018, following the “Elgar Parishad’ conclave that they participated in on December 31, 2017 at Pune.
…. Jenny Rowena, partner of another BK 16 undertrial prisoner Prof Hany Babu, shares Navlakha’s views on what incarceration robs from an individual. Babu, who is also lodged in Taloja Central jail, completed five years of incarceration as an undertrial this July.
Read more

▪ The Cell and the Soul – A Prison Memoir

Author: Anand Teltumbde
Publishing Date: Sep 2025
Publisher: Bloomsbury India
Pages: 256

Noted social activist Anand Teltumbde entered the Taloja Central Prison as accused number 10 in the Bhima Koregaon case and spent 31 months as an undertrial until he was released on bail. As an intellectual who was stripped of his freedom, he lays bares the chilling realities of India’s prisons in his gut-wrenching prison memoir. Part memoir, part diary, Cell and the Soul is a descent into the heart of India’s carceral state, ripping open the belly of the beast-the prison industrial complex-and exposing the brutal, pulsating injustice within.
Read more / order

▪ Sudhir Dhawale: “This is a bigger prison” (The Caravan | by Sudhir Dhawale | Apr 2025)
▪ Sudhir Dhawale interview: ‘The law remains blind to injustice even with the blindfold gone’ (Scroll.in / Feb 2025)
▪ Sudhir Dhawale: ‘Never Imagined Meeting Hardened Criminals’ (Rediff.com / Jan 2025)
▪ Some personal reflections on prison medical care (The Leaflet | by Vernon Gonsalves | Apr 2024)

Transfer of case to NIA | High Court questions Gadling’s plea, says accused can’t choose probe agency

26/09/2025 Asha

Hindustan Times / by Karuna Nidhi

On June 6, 2018, Gadling and Dhawale were arrested under stringent sections of the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA), for their alleged links with the Maoists and the conspiracy to incite violence in Bhima Koregaon
The Bombay High Court on Thursday questioned the maintainability of a petition filed by Bhima Koregaon conspiracy case accused Surendra Gadling and Sudhir Dhawale, contending the transfer of the case from the Pune police to the National Investigation Agency (NIA) in January 2020 was politically motivated.
… The bench adjourned the matter for further hearing on October 9 after Talekar sought time to respond to the court’s query.
Read more

Also read:
▪ Why caste Hindutva, not an Elgar conspiracy, is at the root of the Bhima Koregaon violence (The Polis Project / Feb 2025)
▪ Surendra Gadling and Sudhir Dhawale Challenge Transfer of Elgar Parishad Probe to NIA (Gauri Lankesh News / Jul 2021)
▪ ‘Centre’s Decision to Hand Bhima Koregaon to NIA Unconstitutional’: Maha Home Minister (The Wire / Jan 2020)
▪ Deputy CM raises doubts in case against 10 activists, seeks proof in 15 days (Scroll.in / Jan 2020)
▪ Bhima-Koregaon case transferred to NIA to compromise independent probe: Front Line Defenders (Jan 2020)

Elgar Parishad case accused at event that attacked Maharashtra Public Security Bill

22/05/2025 Asha

Elgar Parishad case accused at event that attacked Maharashtra Public Security Bill, cops to seek bail review

22/05/2025

Times of India / by Soumitra Bose

The Elgar Parishad case accused, who are out on bail, had thronged the Veera Sathidar memorial event at Vidarbha Hindi Sahitya Sammelan on May 13, top security sources told TOI.
Though the event was organised as a memorial for the acclaimed filmmaker, security agency sources stated it turned into a platform for attacking the Maharashtra govt’s efforts to table the proposed Maharashtra Public Security Bill to rein in frontal organisations of alleged urban Maoists.
… Activists like Sudhir Dhawale and former Nagpur University professor Soma Sen, who are out on bail in the Elgar Parishad case, participated in the event
Read more

Actor’s wife, 2 others booked for reciting Pak poet’s poem

21/05/2025

Rediff.com / by pti, edited by Hemant Waje

The recitation of Pakistani poet Faiz Ahmad Faiz’s Hum Dekhenge poem at an event in Nagpur has led police to slap charges of endangering India’s unity and integrity, and promoting enmity against three persons, including late actor-activist Veera Sathidar’s wife Pushpa.
… Police said they are also looking into the activities and background of the Samata Kala Manch, whose head, Sudhir Dhawale, is currently out on bail in connection with another case related to alleged inflammatory speeches made during the Elgar Parishad event in Pune in 2017.
Read more

Singing Faiz’s ‘Hum Dekhenge’ is ‘Sedition’: Nagpur Police Book Organisers of Vira Sathidar Memorial

19/05/2025

The Wire / by Sukanyana Shantha

Singing the revolutionary poetry of Faiz Ahmed Faiz, once celebrated as a voice of resistance, now attracts sedition charges in India.
At an event organised last week in memory of actor and activist Vira Sathidar, a group of young cultural activists sang the lyrics of Faiz’s famous Hum Dekhenge.
… In October 2020, when the NIA filed a supplementary chargesheet in the Elgar Parishad case, Sathidar’s name appeared among the so-called “urban Naxals,” a term loosely used by the Devendra Fadnavis-led government to target dissenters. Now, with the Maharashtra Special Public Security Bill, the state government seeks to formalise the term “urban Naxal” within the legal framework.
Read more

Also read:
▪ Rona Wilson and Sudhir Dhawale released: Seven years of injustice by a state that punishes dissent [read order] (Sabrangindia / Jan 2025)
▪ Former professor Shoma Sen released from prison (Scroll.in / Apr 2024)
▪ A New Bill Shows Maharashtra Wants to Become a Police State Before Combatting Left-Wing Extremism (The Wire / Jul 2024)
▪ What is Maharashtra’s new Bill to curb ‘Naxalism in urban areas’? (The Indian Express / Jul 2024)
▪ Maharashtra: Activists, Lawyers Added to ‘Union War Book’, Listed as ‘Enemies of the State’ (The Wire / Jul 2021)

Sudhir Dhawale: “This is a bigger prison”

01/04/2025 Asha

The Caravan / by Shahid Tantray

A Bhima Koregaon political prisoner reflects on his release.
The author and activist Sudhir Dhawale was released on 24 January, after six years and seven months in jail. Dhawale, who founded the anti-caste group Republican Panthers Jatiantachi Chalwal and publishes the Marathi magazine Vidrohi, was one of the organisers of the Elgar Parishad, on 31 December 2017, a day before caste violence broke out on the two-hundredth anniversary of the Battle of Bhima Koregaon. …
Shahid Tantray, a multimedia reporter at The Caravan, spoke to Dhawale at his organisation’s Mumbai office.
Read more

Also read:
▪ BK-16 Prison Diaries: Sudhir Dhawale’s poem, “Prisoners of Consciousness” (The Polis Project / March 2025)
▪ Sudhir Dhawale interview: ‘The law remains blind to injustice even with the blindfold gone’ (Scroll.in / Feb 2025)
▪ Interview | Sudhir Dhawale’s Work Will Go on (The Wire / Feb 2025)
▪ Sudhir Dhawale: ‘Never Imagined Meeting Hardened Criminals’ (Rediff.com / Jan 2025)
▪ Rona Wilson and Sudhir Dhawale released: Seven years of injustice by a state that punishes dissent [read order] (Sabrangindia / Jan 2025)
▪ Arun Ferreira: The government is muzzling people’s movement in the country (Midday / June 2018)

BK-16 Prison Diaries: Sudhir Dhawale’s poem, “Prisoners of Consciousness”

07/03/2025 Asha

To mark six years of the arbitrary arrests and imprisonment of political dissidents in the Bhima Koregaon case, The Polis Project is publishing a series of writings by the BK-16, and their families, friends and partners. By describing various aspects of the past six years, the series offers a glimpse into the BK-16’s lives inside prison, as well as the struggles of their loved ones outside. Each piece in the series is complemented by Arun Ferreira’s striking and evocative artwork.

Drawing by Arun Ferreira / The Polis Project

BK-16 Prison Diaries: Sudhir Dhawale’s poem, “Prisoners of Consciousness”

07/03/2025

The Polis Project / by Sudhir Dhawale translated to English by Vernon Gonsalves

Of the six-and-a-half years I spent in prison in the Bhima Koregaon-Elgar Parishad case, four-and-a-half years were in the Anda cell. The Anda cell is a prison within a prison. Its stony walls and sight-obscuring forest of iron bars put the mental fortitude, ideological endurance and courage to the test. What happened to political prisoners like me confined to these cells of darkness? Why have prisons been built? For whom, and by whom? Prison is marked by many contradictions—between exploitation and theft; prisons and justice; prisons and democracy; prisons and correctional homes.
Read more

Approver | A Poem From Prison by Sudhir Dhawale

22/02/2025 Asha

Outlook India / by Sudhir Dhawale, translated from Marathi to English by Vernon Gonsalves

Dalit rights activist Sudhir Dhawale, accused in the Bhima Koregaon case wrote this poem in prison on ‘Why he will not collaborate’
… The following poem is an ode to his artiste friends Sagar Gorkhe and Ramesh Gaichor from Kabir Kala Manch, who were arrested in connection with the same case in 2020 by the National Investigation Agency. Before their arrests, the duo released a video, disclosing that they were being threatened by security agencies to turn an approver and spend less time behind bars. The two continue to remain imprisoned.

I didn’t plant the bomb,
I didn’t even dream of it,
I shall not collaborate, with you.

Read the poem in full

Also read/watch:
▪ Sudhir Dhawale interview: ‘The law remains blind to injustice even with the blindfold gone’ (Scroll.in / Feb 2025)
▪ Interview | Sudhir Dhawale’s Work Will Go on (The Wire / Feb 2025)
▪ Rona Wilson and Sudhir Dhawale released: Seven years of injustice by a state that punishes dissent [read order] (Sabrangindia / Jan 2025)
▪ WE ARE CHILDREN OF AMBEDKAR: Shahir Ramesh and Sagar

hindi/english subtitles | 07:26min | 2020

Shahir Sagar Gorkhe and Shahir Ramesh Gaichor, prominent members of Bhima Koregaon Shauryadin Prerna Abhiyan and Kabir Kala Manch, found themselves at the receiving end of the BJP government’s actions when they were arrested by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) on 7th September 2020.
Both Shahir Sagar Gorkhe and Shahir Ramesh Gaichor have asserted that the NIA forced them to provide false testimony against those already arrested. They were coerced into writing confessional statements seeking forgiveness and implicating other individuals in the case. However, their steadfast refusal to comply with these unjust demands has put them at risk of being arrested by the NIA.
In a recorded video statement, Sagar emphasized their commitment to following the constitution and their allegiance to Dr. Ambedkar, stating, “We aren’t progenies of Savarkar but are children of Dr. Ambedkar. Confessing to things we have never done is out of the question.”

Watch video